Teaching ocaml programming

[Andrej Bauer-3]

Once again I am teaching a course on theory of programming languages in
which we will use ocaml to implement mini-languages. And once again I
face the question: which programming environment should we use?

I have so far tried to use (under Windows)
1. cygwin + ocaml + XEmacs
2. Eclipse + OcaIDE

The second solution worked better than the first, for the simple reason
that XEmacs is a complete mystery to students. They really, really hate
it. But even with the second soltion we had a lot of trouble, because
Eclipse is really complicated, and OcaIDE is sort of experimental and
not so good under Windows, so the whole setup was confusing and fragile.

The requirements are very simple:
1. easy access to toplevel (with line-editing)
2. editor which can send stuff to toplevel, points to errors in source
code, and is not Emacs.

Any ideas what to do? We have dual-boot machines (Windows + Ubuntu).

Best regards,

Andrej

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[Lukasz Stafiniak]

Have you tried configuring a recent GNU Emacs to work like a normal
editor? (e.g. with C-c, C-v editing shortcuts etc.) This shouldn't be
difficult.

On Fri, Sep 26, 2008 at 1:30 PM, Andrej Bauer
<Andrej.Bauer@...> wrote:
> Once again I am teaching a course on theory of programming languages in
> which we will use ocaml to implement mini-languages. And once again I face
> the question: which programming environment should we use?
>
> I have so far tried to use (under Windows)
> 1. cygwin + ocaml + XEmacs
> 2. Eclipse + OcaIDE
>

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[Andrej Bauer-3]

Lukasz Stafiniak wrote:
> Have you tried configuring a recent GNU Emacs to work like a normal
> editor? (e.g. with C-c, C-v editing shortcuts etc.) This shouldn't be
> difficult.

My teaching asistant showed the students how to do this, but it was only
partially successful, not to mention that this required extra
configuration. _Any_ initial configuration is a big pain, even just
putting a line in .emacs is a challenge ("Where is this file?", "How can
it have just an extension and no name?", "Why is the extension longer
than three letters", etc.)

I just spent 20 minutes trying to compile Cameleon and failed. I then
installed the Ubuntu version which is completely broken (this is Ubuntu
8.04), and even if it worked, I would not want to use it because it
clearly suffers from the "the user will configure me" syndrome.

Andrej

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[Andrej Bauer-3]

Camelia, http://camelia.sourceforge.net/, looks perfect, but
unfortunately also not maintained anymore. I am failing to compile it
under Linux because it (seemingly) wants a rather old version of Qt.
Maybe we should resurrect it.

Andrej

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[Brighten Godfrey]

Depending on how flexible you are, nedit + shell might be a workable  
choice.  It is a clean, intuitive, but sufficiently powerful editor.  
Emacs always left me annoyed.

I use, on a daily basis, a small script which acts as a front-end to  
`make' and automatically points you to the error in the code in  
nedit, highlighting the characters that the ocaml compiler complains  
about.  It uses the existing nedit window if you have the file open  
already, or else opens it for you.  The script also works with gcc  
instead of ocaml, and (though I can't vouch for it much) gvim instead  
of nedit.  So my typical development environment consists of nedit  
and a shell in which I compile via the script.

If anyone is interested, I'd be happy to share this.

I guess the main question would be integrating the toplevel with  
nedit.  I imagine there are a number of ways to do this, depending on  
your needs.  You might be able to put something together using  
nedit's scripting language, or just do something entirely external to  
the editor.

~Brighten

On Sep 26, 2008, at 4:30 AM, Andrej Bauer wrote:

> Once again I am teaching a course on theory of programming  
> languages in which we will use ocaml to implement mini-languages.  
> And once again I face the question: which programming environment  
> should we use?
>
> I have so far tried to use (under Windows)
> 1. cygwin + ocaml + XEmacs
> 2. Eclipse + OcaIDE
>
> The second solution worked better than the first, for the simple  
> reason that XEmacs is a complete mystery to students. They really,  
> really hate it. But even with the second soltion we had a lot of  
> trouble, because Eclipse is really complicated, and OcaIDE is sort  
> of experimental and not so good under Windows, so the whole setup  
> was confusing and fragile.
>
> The requirements are very simple:
> 1. easy access to toplevel (with line-editing)
> 2. editor which can send stuff to toplevel, points to errors in  
> source code, and is not Emacs.
>
> Any ideas what to do? We have dual-boot machines (Windows + Ubuntu).
>
> Best regards,
>
> Andrej

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[Andrej Bauer-3]

How can there be no easy to use interface?! This is pathetic.

Python has IDLE. Scheme has drscheme. Java has drjava. What does Haskell
have?

I compiled Camelia (which required me to debug C++ code for the first
time in about 20 years). It's kind of ok. The user interface is a bit
broken, lots of uneccessary pop-up dialogs (e.g., for every error message).

Andrej

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[Mehdi Dogguy-2]

Andrej Bauer wrote:
> How can there be no easy to use interface?! This is pathetic.
>
> Python has IDLE. Scheme has drscheme. Java has drjava.
>

And OCaml has Emacs :)

--
Mehdi Dogguy
http://www.pps.jussieu.fr/~dogguy

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[Hugo Ferreira]

Hello,

Andrej Bauer wrote:

> Once again I am teaching a course on theory of programming languages in
> which we will use ocaml to implement mini-languages. And once again I
> face the question: which programming environment should we use?
>
> I have so far tried to use (under Windows)
> 1. cygwin + ocaml + XEmacs
> 2. Eclipse + OcaIDE
>
> The second solution worked better than the first, for the simple reason
> that XEmacs is a complete mystery to students. They really, really hate
> it. But even with the second soltion we had a lot of trouble, because
> Eclipse is really complicated, and OcaIDE is sort of experimental and
> not so good under Windows, so the whole setup was confusing and fragile.
>

I am a satisfied user of Eclipse + OcaIDE on Ubuntu (64bit).
Considering I am (still) a "newbie" in regards to Ocaml and functional
programming in general, and have a allergy towards emacs, vi and
friends, I would urge you to reconsider OcaIDE + Ubuntu.

To make things simpler you may:
0. Use ocamlbuild projects only.
1. Prepare ocamlbuild files (tags and myocamlbuild) if necessary.
2. Provide a workspace with an example project ready for compilation.
3. Let the students use only one project with various source files.

Point (0) will significantly ease the students experience if they
need not configure any build files. Points (1) and (2) allow you to
add references to used modules, libraries, etc. All the students
do is create a new file, compile and execute.

Point (3) is easy because students need only add a single entry in
the project properties dialogue box (Project targets). They need
only then point and click on the executable to execute and/or debug.

My 2 cents.

HTHs,
Hugo F.








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[Andrej Bauer-3]

Hugo Ferreira wrote:
> To make things simpler you may:
> 0. Use ocamlbuild projects only.
> 1. Prepare ocamlbuild files (tags and myocamlbuild) if necessary.
> 2. Provide a workspace with an example project ready for compilation.
> 3. Let the students use only one project with various source files.

Yes, we do all of this, but unfortunately ocamlbuild under Windows sucks
because the trick with symbolic links to executables does not work. Has
this been fixed yet? (Also, ocamlbuild assumes bash is in the path, also
under Windows.)

Best regards,

Andrej

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[Hugo Ferreira]

Andrej Bauer wrote:
> Hugo Ferreira wrote:
>> To make things simpler you may:
>> 0. Use ocamlbuild projects only.
>> 1. Prepare ocamlbuild files (tags and myocamlbuild) if necessary.
>> 2. Provide a workspace with an example project ready for compilation.
>> 3. Let the students use only one project with various source files.
>
> Yes, we do all of this, but unfortunately ocamlbuild under Windows sucks
> because the trick with symbolic links to executables does not work.

Yes, I am aware of this. Seen the reports in the forum.

> Has
> this been fixed yet? (Also, ocamlbuild assumes bash is in the path, also
> under Windows.)

Not that I am aware of. Their is a version that has *not* been
put up onto the update site [1]. Maybe this may have additional
corrections.

Please note that I am proposing you use Ubuntu because you mentioned
dual boot machines:

"Any ideas what to do? We have dual-boot machines (Windows + Ubuntu)."

BTW, I just remembered that I use GODI. Don't know if that is possible
for you.

Regards,
Hugo F.


http://ocaml.eclipse.free.fr/files/Ocaml_1.2.3.jar

>
> Best regards,
>
> Andrej
>
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[Peng Zang]

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If you have dual-boot machines, why not try Ocaml + Emacs + tuareg-mode in
Ubuntu?

You can install tuareg-mode globally so that no one has to touch a .emacs or
know about it.  If it's the keyboard shortcuts that students are not used to,
they can 1) deal or 2) you can remap some common shortcuts and wrap it in a
shell script so they run Emacs-for-class instead of standard Emacs.  
Personally, I think they should just deal.  A little exposure to a
non-Windows environment, a little broadening of horizons, all good stuff.

When I took a programming languages class at UIUC, that is how we learned
OCaml.  I found it quite easy to pick up.  Emacs has the best toplevel
integration with OCaml and it sounds like you want to make heavy use of it.

Peng

PS. I just looked at IDLE and Emacs + OCaml blows it out of the water.  I
swear IDLE is like a mini-subset of Emacs.  Even the keyboard shortcuts are
the same.  If you like IDLE, Emacs + OCaml can only be better.



On Friday 26 September 2008 07:30:00 am Andrej Bauer wrote:

> Once again I am teaching a course on theory of programming languages in
> which we will use ocaml to implement mini-languages. And once again I
> face the question: which programming environment should we use?
>
> I have so far tried to use (under Windows)
> 1. cygwin + ocaml + XEmacs
> 2. Eclipse + OcaIDE
>
> The second solution worked better than the first, for the simple reason
> that XEmacs is a complete mystery to students. They really, really hate
> it. But even with the second soltion we had a lot of trouble, because
> Eclipse is really complicated, and OcaIDE is sort of experimental and
> not so good under Windows, so the whole setup was confusing and fragile.
>
> The requirements are very simple:
> 1. easy access to toplevel (with line-editing)
> 2. editor which can send stuff to toplevel, points to errors in source
> code, and is not Emacs.
>
> Any ideas what to do? We have dual-boot machines (Windows + Ubuntu).
>
> Best regards,
>
> Andrej
>
> _______________________________________________
> Caml-list mailing list. Subscription management:
> http://yquem.inria.fr/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/caml-list
> Archives: http://caml.inria.fr
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> Bug reports: http://caml.inria.fr/bin/caml-bugs

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[Richard Jones-4]

On Fri, Sep 26, 2008 at 01:52:33PM +0200, Andrej Bauer wrote:
> My teaching asistant showed the students how to do this, but it was only
> partially successful, not to mention that this required extra
> configuration. _Any_ initial configuration is a big pain, even just
> putting a line in .emacs is a challenge ("Where is this file?", "How can
> it have just an extension and no name?", "Why is the extension longer
> than three letters", etc.)

I think I may have suggested this the last time, but is some sort of
bootable live CD / live USB key an option?  Our livecd-creator tool is
especially flexible: you could build a live CD / key which has all the
right packages installed and all the configuration files in the right
place and starts up the editor of your choice when they log in.

http://www-128.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/l-fedora-livecd/index.html
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/FedoraLiveCD/LiveCDHowTo

Persistence (of files in the project) is a problem but maybe they can
be encouraged to save project files to a network share or on to a USB
key.

Rich.

--
Richard Jones
Red Hat

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[Peng Zang]

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You know, I love that idea.  I've been meaning to use it for some of my
projects and keep forgetting about it.  Thanks for reminding me,

Peng

On Friday 26 September 2008 10:31:40 am Richard Jones wrote:

> On Fri, Sep 26, 2008 at 01:52:33PM +0200, Andrej Bauer wrote:
> > My teaching asistant showed the students how to do this, but it was only
> > partially successful, not to mention that this required extra
> > configuration. _Any_ initial configuration is a big pain, even just
> > putting a line in .emacs is a challenge ("Where is this file?", "How can
> > it have just an extension and no name?", "Why is the extension longer
> > than three letters", etc.)
>
> I think I may have suggested this the last time, but is some sort of
> bootable live CD / live USB key an option?  Our livecd-creator tool is
> especially flexible: you could build a live CD / key which has all the
> right packages installed and all the configuration files in the right
> place and starts up the editor of your choice when they log in.
>
> http://www-128.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/l-fedora-livecd/index.h
>tml http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/FedoraLiveCD/LiveCDHowTo
>
> Persistence (of files in the project) is a problem but maybe they can
> be encouraged to save project files to a network share or on to a USB
> key.
>
> Rich.

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[Dario Teixeira-3]

Hi,

Your problem is simplified by the fact you already have dual
boot machines (if not, Richard's live CD idea is always a good
option).  Unix is Ocaml's natural habitat, and some of the
problems you mentioned (like symlinks for Ocamlbuild) would
simply go away if you boot into Ubuntu.

I got the impression your students are not too familiar with
Unix.  Well, if that's the case I think in the long term they
can only benefit by being exposed to it.  I once had to teach
3rd year Compsci students the fundamentals of Unix programming
in C.  Much to my surprise, some of them didn't even know how
to use basic shell commands or to invoke gcc!  I guess my
predecessors had sheltered them too much from the "big bad
Unix".

Now, I understand you may be reluctant to spend valuable class
time teaching them the rudiments of Unix, but I reckon that if
you provide them with the relevant configuration files they can
be up and running in less than half an hour.  And I bet that
some of them may even discover that they prefer Unix.

Cheers,
Dario





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[Arthur Chan]

I think we should think outside the box here.

Make sure your OCaml has prerequisites that involve some shittier language like C, which is taught in a Unix environment with xemacs.  Once the students have seen how awful it can get and they associate the terrible learning experience with C (what's with the lack of love for emacs anyway? =/), then you come to the rescue.  :-D

Btw, I wouldn't try to use OCaml with Ubuntu, or *any* recent language that has been in development.  Support is generally flaky.  The mainline OCaml that comes with Ubuntu is fine, but the gl+gtk support is broken.  The version of Eclipse that ships with Ubuntu is freaking ancient and won't support the Scala plugin.  From what I remember, 8.0.4 also shipped with some fossilized version of Scala itself.

On Fri, Sep 26, 2008 at 6:33 AM, Andrej Bauer <Andrej.Bauer@...> wrote:

Hugo Ferreira wrote:

To make things simpler you may:
0. Use ocamlbuild projects only.
1. Prepare ocamlbuild files (tags and myocamlbuild) if necessary.
2. Provide a workspace with an example project ready for compilation.
3. Let the students use only one project with various source files.

Yes, we do all of this, but unfortunately ocamlbuild under Windows sucks because the trick with symbolic links to executables does not work. Has this been fixed yet? (Also, ocamlbuild assumes bash is in the path, also under Windows.)

Best regards,

Andrej

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[Andrej Bauer]

As far as I see, there are two options:

1) Windows + Eclipse + OcaIDE

2) Linux.

The students know next to nothing about Unix. If I dive into using
Linux, then I might as well setup anonymous subversion access to source
code. They could use gedit for editing (it has ocaml syntax hilight
mode), and the shell for ocamlbuild. The only unresolved question is how
to deal with compilation errors.

The generation that I am getting is very small (maybe 10 students), so
this might be doable with such a small number.

I will think about it. Thanks for your suggestions.

By the way, Live CD is not really an option. I suspect the computer lab
computers are "protected" against that.

Best regards,

Andrej

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[Richard Jones-4]

On Fri, Sep 26, 2008 at 09:15:14AM -0700, Arthur Chan wrote:
> Make sure your OCaml has prerequisites that involve some shittier language
> like C, which is taught in a Unix environment with xemacs.  Once the
> students have seen how awful it can get and they associate the terrible
> learning experience with C (what's with the lack of love for emacs anyway?
> =/), then you come to the rescue.  :-D

For extra points, make sure they have to ensure that every error is
checked and every error path out of the function must free up all
resources that have been allocated ...

> Btw, I wouldn't try to use OCaml with Ubuntu, or *any* recent language that
> has been in development.  Support is generally flaky.  The mainline OCaml
> that comes with Ubuntu is fine, but the gl+gtk support is broken.  The
> version of Eclipse that ships with Ubuntu is freaking ancient and won't
> support the Scala plugin.  From what I remember, 8.0.4 also shipped with
> some fossilized version of Scala itself.

[I'm going to diss Ubuntu here ... you know where I'm coming from]

Ubuntu's OCaml support is very flaky.  They don't have developers
committed to it and take a random snapshot of what's in Debian.  This
has in the past led to serious brokenness where they've taken a
snaphot in the middle of a rebuild-the-world compiler upgrade.
Instead go with Debian (or Fedora) where there are developers making
sure you get a consistent, working OCaml.

Rich.

--
Richard Jones
Red Hat

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